Taiwan is a country that gets overshadowed by its neighbouring countries, and as such, its cuisine is far less well-known than the cuisines of Korea, Japan and China.
Taiwanese cuisine, however, features a nice little blend of Chinese food, but with a twist. Due to Taiwan's geography, being a small island-nation, seafood is featured prominently on dishes throughout the country. In typical Asian fashion, meat is also found on nearly every Taiwanese dish - particularly pork and beef, and rice is served with virtually every meal.
I mean, hey, in Asia, rice is king.
Taiwanese flavours, however, are quite unique, and Taipei's many food markets along with the rich, traditional cuisine offer up something for pretty much everyone.
Beef-noodle soup is probably one of Taiwan's most famous dishes. Every single travel blog said that having a good bowl of this soup is a must when travelling through Taiwan, and so I had to do it. Finding a good bowl of beef-noodle soup actually proved quite difficult, particularly because everything was written in Chinese and, for some reason, nothing was in English, unlike in Seoul, where things are at least translated into English in the downtown core. What's more, hardly anyone spoke any English, and wifi was quite hard to come by in the centre of Taipei that I couldn't even rely on my translator app. Even the menus hardly even showed photos of the food, so what was I supposed to know what I was ordering?!?!
On my second day in Taipei, as I was taking a day trip to Yangmingshan National Park, I was able to stop for lunch at a small restaurant on my way toward the park, and I was finally able to order myself a good beef-noodle. It was actually a lot more expensive than everything else on the menu, costing around $160 Taiwanese Dollars (roughly $6.75 CAD or $5.50 USD), but well worth it. The soup came with pieces of beef, tons of noodles, and some spinach. It was really delicious, the broth was rich and flavourful, and all the components were perfectly cooked. They did say that it was impossible to find a bad beef-noodle soup in Taiwan, and, well, my experience was quite positive.
Ever heard of Din Tai Fung? Unfortunately, this chain does not exist in Canada, but it does have branches in 13 countries outside of Taiwan, including in Korea, the U.S., and even in the United Arab Emirates. Go figure.
This famous dumpling chain originated in Taipei, and I managed to visit the original location! The chain actually has four restaurants in Taipei itself, and there is always a lineup of at least half an hour to go in and get a table. My new hostel friends and I had an idea: order takeout (five-minute wait) and eat at the tables just outside the restaurant in the shopping mall, so that's what we did.
Din Tai Fung is particularly famous for its dumplings, in particular its soup dumplings, known in Mandarin as "Xiaolongbao," though there are surely many more delicious items on the menu. While waiting for our food to arrive, we even had the pleasure of watching the talented cooks make some of their famous dumplings.
The dumplings cost roughly $200 NTD (roughly $8.50 CAD or $7.00 USD), so kind of expensive for Taiwan, but they were absolutely delicious! The proper way to eat them, apparently, is to drip a touch of soy sauce onto your spoon, and then delicately place the dumpling on the spoon. Then, use one chopstick to poke a hole on the side of the dumpling so that the juice all falls out into the spoon. Finally, enjoy, as the blend of flavours will surely delight.
Twice while running around Taipei on my own I decided to pop into a random restaurant and just see what I could order. One of these restaurants was in the Zhongshan neighbourhood, near the central station, and had a huge lineup outside. I pointed to the one photo on the menu, which seemed to be a pork-and-rice dish. The lady told me that there was no more rice, and asked if I'd accept some chicken. Chicken it was. The chicken sat atop a mix of vegetables, some fish balls, an egg, and, obviously, a bunch of rice. I actually really enjoyed it.
The second time was during my last day in Taipei, and I was quite hungry while hanging around the area near the Taipei 101 Tower. I passed this restaurant that seemed quite interesting, and just pointed to what I wanted. This time I got fish with a bunch of vegetables and rice, which was also quite tasty.
One common theme that I noticed at all of the restaurants that I ate at, which actually really bothered me, was that we were consistently served disposable chopsticks, disposable cups, disposable plates and disposable spoons. Once finished, we were supposed to chuck it all into the trash can. Clearly nothing was getting washed or reused, and we were just contributing to waste and adding to the pollution...
While walking around central Taipei at night, my hostel friend and I stumbled upon a restaurant with an absolutely massive lineup. The line was so long that it swung around the block, but it seemed to be moving quite fast. All the while, tons of people were walking around eating the same meal, which turned out to be this soup pictured above. Filled with curiosity, we just had to queue up and give it a try. I still don't quite know what this meal is, though I believe it contains some sort of intestines, along with noodles and shrimp. It was pretty good, though quite a bit salty.
One of the most delicious dishes that I did try in Taiwan was this combination of pork-braised rice and fish-ball soup (again, in disposable dishes...). I tasted this dish in Jiufen during my day trip there, and it was really delicious. The pork and rice proved to be a very strong combination, and the fish balls, along with the flavourful broth were sublime.
As I mentioned when I wrote about Taipei, the city is really famous for its night markets. The city features four really famous night markets, and there are surely many other smaller markets throughout the city. The Shilin Night Market is perhaps the city's most popular, and, as my first meal there, I was happy to indulge in squid and crab. We struggled at getting the squid out from its shell, but all in all it was quite the delicious meal.
Taipei's seafood was indeed quite delicious, and its octopus was no exception. On my last night in Taipei, I visited the market again and I had some leftover Taiwanese money to spend, so I got myself a nice lobster tentacle, which the guy made a huge display while cooking it for me. He spiced it with salt and pepper, to my liking, and I savoured the tender octopus while strolling through the rest of the market.
Among the highlights at the market was the oyster mushroom. There was literally a chain of people all working together to perfectly prepare this mushroom, and it was well-worth the wait. The mushrooms were first cleaned, then grilled, then marinated, then cut up and grilled again before finally being chopped up and served with the customer's desired spice. This mushrooms definitely ranks among my top culinary experiences in Taiwan.
Two foods that were virtually unavoidable at these street markets were the skewered sausage and the brochette. The sausage, in particular, was being eaten by virtually everyone, and so I had to try. The skin is actually quite crispy, and the inside was softer, Overall, it was quite good, though very meaty. The brochette was also quite delicious, well seasoned and marinated, and very tender.
Finally, it's not a trip to Taiwan if you don't taste the country's most famous export: Bubble Tea! Bubble teas in Taiwan come in all shapes and sized and with a huge variety of flavour combinations. I got a total of three delicious bubble teas while in Taiwan, and enjoyed every last drop. Bubble tea shops can be found, without fail, on every single street corner in Taipei, so you're bound to stumble upon quite a few while you're there. Obviously indulging in bubble tea with tapioca is even more delicious, but really, it's hard to go wrong on this one.
Indeed, Taiwan brought about many unexpected but delicious culinary surprises., offering up some East-Asian charms, but with a twist.
-Daniele
